Pick of the Month

WITF's Pick of the Month bring's you the very best books and more. Every month we’ll recommend a great book for you to check out--from biographies and novels to poetry, children’s books and more. We’ll promote selections monthly on WITF TV and on WITF FM 89.5. Read along with us as we discover literary finds that engage, enlighten and entertain. Bookmark this page to keep up to date with the latest info about monthly picks—including details on how you can meet the authors. Pick up a copy and start reading today!

April's Pick of the Month: 'Silver Like Dust'

We've teamed up with the folks at Midtown Scholar Bookstore in Harrisburg to bring you the Pick of the Month. Every month we'll recommend a great book for you to check out--from biographies and novels to poetry, children's books and more. We'll promote selections monthly on witf TV and on witf FM 89.5. Read along with us as we discover literary finds that engage, enlighten and entertain.

The Pick of the Month for April 2012 is Silver Like Dust by Kimi Cunningham Grant.

Description:

Shopping for rice flour pastries in Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo. Braving the snowstorms of harsh Wyoming winters. Finding a mate, birthing children, raising a family. Watching the sunrise from Florida’s sandy beaches. Jostling for used books at Friends of the Library sales. Surviving cancer. Packing up photo albums and resettling in Central Pennsylvania.

Kimi Cunningham Grant’s Silver Like Dust (Pegasus Books, 2012) is an eloquent memoir of a Japanese-American family from the early twentieth century to the present day. In an evocative series of conversations with her grandmother, Grant peels back the years to uncover the devotion, anguish, and resilience that have marked her grandmother’s eventful life.

The core of this compelling story is Grant’s reconstruction of the challenges and heartaches of her immigrant family’s imprisonment in war-time internment camps in Pomona, California, and Heart Mountain, Wyoming.

Combining the descriptive powers of a gifted writer with engaging historical and personal reflections, Grant expands our contemporary understandings as she reflects on the past. By moving seamlessly between her grandmother’s dramatic reminiscences and the quotidian experiences of modern suburban life, she explores how families make sense of their histories.

Grant grew up in rural Central PA, graduated from Messiah College, and received a Pennsylvania Council of the Arts Fellowship in creative nonfiction. She is an English Instructor at Penn State - State College.

Meet the author:

Join Kimi Cunningham Grant at the Midtown Scholar Bookstore on Saturday, April 28th at 3 PM, for a conversation about Silver Like Dust in a book salon hosted by Central PA poet Julia Spicher Kasdorf, Associate Professor of English and Women’s Studies at Penn State - State College.

Blog along with us:

Would you like to share your personal review of the Pick of the Month on our website? We'd love to hear what you think about each month's selection and are looking for community members to read along with us and then blog about the pick. If you're interested, please fill out this form to start blogging with us.